Hello brides to be! Today we have the first post in my series about stress free wedding planning. You’ve taken the plunge and decided to get married – which is excellent news – but planning your wedding can be a stressful business.
Rolls Royce and a Country House Hotel? That sounds nice.
I’ve teamed up with Sarah Tugwell of Sprinkle of Magic Wedding Planners(shiny new website coming soon!)- dubbed “The Wedding Queen of the High Peak” to bring you some tips and advice on how to make the process of planning your wedding less mind-bendingly stressful.
There is an ebook coming out now – free of course – that we’ve written together so you can have all this information in one handy guide. To get your copy, click here: Stress Free Wedding Planning
I thought it would be nice to serialise it on the blog too, however, so we can share Sarah’s unique insights with as many brides-to-be as possible.
This first post deals with two important considerations – your budget, and the idea that your wedding should be all about you. Sarah says “A wedding is a personal expression of the couple”, which sums it up nicely.
I’d love to hear your comments and feedback – please comment at the end of the post (don’t forget to tick the “also share to Facebook” box), and do feel free to share the post!
Enjoy 🙂
Tim
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Stress Free Wedding Planning
It’s all about you!
How do you want your wedding to be?
Lets start with an easy one. Its your wedding, so its up to you to decide what sort of day you want.
This might sound obvious, but there are probably plenty of people who want to help you make decisions.
Stick to your guns!
Formal or informal? Traditional or Contemporary? Your way or the doorway?
An all-out lavish wedding or something altogether simpler?
What do you want, and how are you going to finance it? Do you have Champagne taste but a cider budget?
Champagne taste and a champagne budget?
Do you want to put your own personal touches on the day – even making favours or decorations yourself? Do you want to stay in the driving seat and decide on all your suppliers?
A package deal from a hotel might cover the basic building blocks, but it’s unlikely to get in all the details you might want. A hotel’s wedding co-ordinator won’t do all the running around organising everything – and certainly not anything that they haven’t booked themselves – that either you yourself or a wedding planner would.
Do you want to consider hiring a professional wedding planner? A good one will oversee all the fine details and make sure everything is right, giving you extra peace of mind.
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Budget & Finances
You need to decide what you really want – a grand no-expense-spared wedding or a simpler one. What suits you best, and what can you afford?
Rolls Royce or farm cart? Both are lovely choices for a wedding, but very different.
Most importantly you need to set a budget right from the beginning. Costs can quickly escalate.
Are you paying for everything yourself, or are others contributing too? Parents or other family members might offer to help out, but in a lot of cases brides and grooms are footing the bill – or at least some of it – themselves.
Two key rules are to save every penny you can, for example by cutting back a bit in other areas such as socialising or extravagant holidays; and if its possible, take on extra work. You might also try to put any money you might receive as gifts, etc, aside.
Be wary of taking on too much debt on credit cards etc – do you want that hanging over you as you start your new life together?
Decide what to spend your budget on – it might be more important to you to have the perfect venue than bespoke hand-made wedding rings, for example.
Be willing to make a few sacrifices now so you can enjoy the wedding you want.
Finances are not to be confused with Finances, which are also important if youre getting married. Ha ha.
Google’s wedding planning tools (see the video I’ve made below) includes a budget calculator amongst other useful stuff – great as a starting point.
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That’s all for now – another subject in the Stress Free Wedding Planning series next time!
If you’re getting married and would like to talk to me about being your wedding photographer, I’d love to hear from you – please contact me here.
I’d love your thoughts and feedback – please comment below, and don’t forget to tick the “also post to Facebook” box. Do feel free to share this post too!
Best regards
Tim
